The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) side impact requirements poses a big challenge for automobile manufacturers. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has tested many vehicles, ranging from small cars to large sports utility vehicles. Achieving exceptional ratings in these tests have been a challenge. The problem recognized with the testing by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) is a much heavier IIHS barrier (1500 kg vs. 1370 kg for FMVSS214 testing procedures) crashes into vehicles at 50 kilometers per hour (kph) and the sides of vehicles have not been effective in dissipating the energy of the barrier before the vehicle interior impacts the occupants. One approach to attain better safety performance in the IIHS testing procedure is to add reinforcement to vehicle sides, while another approach is to change the crash dummy kinematics.
One perceived problem is that severe intrusion by the impact barrier will overwhelm any small design changes; therefore, some other mechanism will be needed in order to put significant impediment forces on the impact barrier to reduce the speed and dynamic crush of the impact barrier, and at the same time divert the crash energy away from the occupants. In an IIHS side impact event, the thorax region of the crash dummy is pushed further inboard than the pelvis area of the crash dummy under conventional vehicle door structure, thereby causing the lower spine of the crash dummy to bend. The upper body of the crash dummy drags the lower body to move inboard. Since the lower body represents a large portion of the crash dummy weight, the thorax and abdomen rib regions are under severe pressure to deform. Most vehicles are rated poorly on the IIHS side impact tests because of excessive rib deflections.
Pelvis pusher blocks are widely used to push the pelvis region of the crash dummy further inboard to release the pressure in the thorax and abdomen areas. The pelvis pusher block is typically made from soft foam, i.e. foams of 25 or 30 psi, and is mounted internally of the side door. Pusher blocks, however, do not operate to divert the crash energy away from the occupant.
A cylindrical tubular reinforcement is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,488,751, granted on Dec. 18, 1984, to Gunter Kling, to provide lateral protection in the door structure of an automotive vehicle. A cantilevered brace is attached to the vehicle underbody and door face plate in U.S. Pat. No. 5,110,176, granted to Cass Curtis on May 5, 1992, to provide improved intrusion resistance upon side impacts. U.S. Pat. No. 6,877,796, issued on Apr. 12, 2005, to Takeyuki Kimura; U.S. Pat. No. 6,923,492, issued to Yuji Okazaki, et al on Aug. 2, 2005; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,926,340, issued on Aug. 9, 2005, to Yukihiro Moriyama, teach a vehicle rear door having a longitudinal impact bar formed by a pipe member and covered by a vertical reinforcement to provide intrusion resistance during lateral impacts.
In U.S. Pat. No. 6,758,491, granted on Jul. 6, 2004, to Jochem Fischer, a connecting tube extends from the A-pillar to the roof frame and serves to increase intrusion resistance when load is applied to the upper vehicle structure. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 7,014,249. granted to Senthil Karuppaswamy, et al on Mar. 21, 2006, is discloses a vehicle door that has an integrally formed impact beam and paddle member for increased structural rigidity, the impact beam being formed on a circular tube and extends across the door to provide protection against lateral impacts.
An impact absorbing door beam has a cylindrical inner pipe enclosed within an elliptical outer pipe, which is attached to the door, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,820,202, issued on Oct. 13, 1998, to Su-Il Ju to provide increased resistance to lateral impacts, allowing the beam to absorb impact forces more effectively without bending. In U.S. Pat. No. 6,382,707, granted on May 7, 2002, to Mark Dunneback, a reinforcement beam for an automotive door extends longitudinally across the door to provide an even load distribution during lateral impacts. The reinforcement beam is attached to brackets at opposing ends of the beam, but includes a cantilevered half portion at one attachment bracket.
A key to achieving a good rating from the IIHS testing in side impact is to distribute the impact load. Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide a device cooperable within the side door of an automotive vehicle to cause a diversion of crash energy away from the occupants in an automotive vehicle in the event of a side impact event.